1. HIGHER EDUCATION
AND
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN
THE CARIBBEAN
Jocelyne Trouillot

2. The socio-economic environmental situation
of the Caribbean

3. NATURAL DISASTERS
• Latin American and the Caribbean face potentially crippling economic and social
costs from natural disasters ( Inter-American Development Bank , 2012)
• Hurricanes
• Hurricanes in the islands resulted in the deaths of 28000 people , disrupted the
lives of 6 million and would have cost 60 billion in damaged property in just a few
years
• Floodings
• Droughts
• landslides
• Earthquakes
• Antigua 1974
• Trinidad 1977
• Jamaica 1993
• Haiti January 2010
• In those last 60 years, Haiti has been hit by 30 important natural disasters , from
major floods and earthquakes and hurricanes.

4. Human made disasters
• Transport disasters
• Civil disorders (riots and civil turbulence)
• Waste disposal hazards

5. DEFORESTATION
• - It is hard to believe that from 1500 to 1900, the
islands which were 90% forest covered have
become in some cases less than 10% forest
covered.
• - In Haiti, where forests once covered the entire
island , today only 3.8 % can be classified as
forest. The causes are multiple: Colonial and
modern exploitation, Lumber, Fuelwood

6. ECONOMIC AND HUMAN
CONSEQUENCES
• Hunger
• Number of undernourished people : 963
million in 2008 (world wide). Many of them
are in the Caribbean region
• 52 million people in Latin America and the
Caribbean suffered from malnutrition
• 10% of tne Caribbean and people from Latin
America go hungry

7. • BUT
The region is the biggest exporter of food in the
world
This illustrates that the main cause of malnutrition
in Latin America and the Caribbean is not a lack
of food production capacity , but poor distribution
of and access to food.
FAO

8. Impoverishment
• In the index of human development by country,
there are only a few Caribbean and Latin
American countries in the higher list
• A few made it to the high human development
list, 9 in the medium human development
category and Haiti in the last category
• High inequality and income differences
• Migration ( illegal work conditions, brain drain)
• Death ( boat people from the islands)

9. DEGRADATION OF CULTURAL CAPITAL
• -The impact of those disasters although usually measured by objective
factors such as number of deaths, monetary cost, damage and loss
property is not only quantitative but is also social, historical and cultural.
•
• -The claim to a national culture in the past does not only rehabilitate that
nation and serve as a justification for the hope of a future national culture.
In the sphere of psycho-affective equilibrium, it is responsible for an
important change in the native. Perhaps we haven’t sufficiently
demonstrated that colonialism is not satisfied merely with holding a
people in its grip and emptying the native’s brain of all form and content.
By a kind of perverted logic, it turns to the past of the oppressed people ,
and distorts, disfigures and destroys it. This work of devaluing pre-colonial
history takes on a dialectal significance today.
• Frantz Fanon The Wretched of the Earth

10. CULTURAL DEPRIVATION
• Artistic heritage
• Spiritual heritage
• Tradition and values
• In Africa, when an older person dies, it is a
library that we loose.
• Language barriers and extinction

11. KNOWLEDGE
History
The settler makes history and is conscious of making it. And because he constantly
refers to the history of his mother country, he clearly indicates that he himself is
the extension of that mother-country. Thus the history which he writes is not the
history of the country which he plunders but the history of his own nation in
regard to all that she skims off, all that she violates and starves.
Fanon
• Medical practices
• Massage, herbal medicine
• Food preparation were substantial for the people
Economy: neighboring and community consumers
farmers markets,

12. EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES
New developments in:
• Energy / solar development: clean, cheap energy
Sunshine …is owned by the whole of humankind, to be
used in the interests of every single citizen on earth.
Which makes solar the greatest ever technological
leveler in the history of humankind, bearing down on
those divides between the have and have-nots. In The
world we made
• . If well developed, computer advances through
internet and the like will improve education and health
care systems, eliminating barriers between countries
and people.

13. Modern technology and conservation
• Water
• Irrigation, purification, domestic use, desalination
can make the difference in the lives of families
who still cannot have clean water.
• Medical science
• regenerative medicine
• Waste
• Handling and recycling
• Where are our baskets?
• Manufacturing

14. The more unequal a country is, the less
content, settled and sharing its people are.
Injustice corrodes the human spirit; it always
has done and it always will.
Jonathan Porritt

15. CONSEQUENCES FOR THE REGION
• Increase of the gap between nations and inside countries
• Rich and richer world
• Poor and poorer world
OR
The Reverse is possible
• Higher education graduates can work towards quality of
life for all
• Good things for all of us
• Sanitation, clean water, medical facilities, employment,
education, housing and better environment, sport and
physical activity, enjoyable and enriching entertainment

16. WHAT WE NEED TO UNLEARN
• The lies my teacher told me
• Traditional farming ,eating, cure, teaching, was not all bad
• Silencing the past
• The production of historical narratives involves the
uneven contribution of competing groups and individuals
who have unequal access to the means of such production
• Michel Rolph Trouillot
• Ivan Illich and the “ academic myth”
• Some deschooling will be necessary

17. WHAT WE NEED TO RE- LEARN
• The power of nature
• The power of people
• The human wisdom

18. CHALLENGES FOR A NEW HIGHER
EDUCATION CURRICULUM
• History
• Retelling history ( manuals or tablets with more
objective data and within a Caribbean perspective)
• Why don’t we have almost no trace of Indian
population in Haiti?
• Gender and history
• Where were and where are the women in our history
books?
• Language Preservation
• Linguistic instruction
• Translation and interpretation

19. New agricultural programs
• In their proposals for a sustainable agriculture,
the study published in Food, Inc recommends
building on the traditional knowledge on
farming communities, with improved access to
land, water and sufficient seeds for
marginalized small scale farmers.
• Aquaculture and its limits
• Reforestation
• Vertical farming
• Preserving our ocean

20. Economy
• Modern food production
• Industrial food production and role of poor
countries
• New types of consumers: You are what you
eat
• New transport systems (bycycling, renewable
battery cars)
• Banking system: electronic currencies

21. Health Education
• Alternative and integrated medicine ( massage, herbal
medicine….)
• Personalized health care
• Students awareness of their health (self management)
• Specific areas of studies: cure and disease prevention
in the islands: malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/aids, maternal
and children mortality
• Studies of advances in the field ( bionic medicine, stem
cell therapies, transplants) and their ethical
implications for poor countries

22. Engineering
• Focus on alternative energy:
• Solar and wind power
• Solar thermal tanks
• New transportation system
. Natural ventilation
. Green roofs

23. Education
• Innovative teaching and methodology
• Creative thinking
• Redesign textbooks and other learning
supports in regard of regional values
• Breaking from rote and passive learning
• Performance and competence for a more
functional university

24. TECHNOLOGY
• A CHANCE TO GRAB
Have it, change it, adapt it
Cage it or fall in the dark age
• Use and adaptation of modern technology for
the well being of all people in areas of
engineering, medicine, nutrition, economy,
agriculture ,and all

25. CULTURAL AWARENESS
• The West had his geniuses. We have ours, the
artefacts, the paintings, the music and all
forms of artistic development, past and
present, that should be in our curriculum

26. Tradition , science and technology
for the well being of the Caribbean
• In conclusion, our higher education system should
constitute a platform to debate and contribute to
solve all issues affecting the region, be it:
• Sustainable agriculture
• Organic eating versus food poisoning
• Industrial food production
• Significance of climate change in the region
• Responsible healthcare
• Genetic inheritance
• Cultural diversity and authors rights

27. The last word
HIGHER EDUCATION WILL MOVE TOWARD
ITS SUMMUM IF WE TEACH OUR STUDENTS
TO HAVE EMPATHY FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE
REGION AND THAT PLACE WHERE WE LIVE.
Thank you